Editor’s note: This week we welcome Rev. Betsy Turner (she/her) as our guest. Betsy shares how the Writing Table has been helpful for her as a pastor and preacher. She is ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA), and she has 14 years of experience as a weekly preacher in various settings. Currently, she has the joy of serving as pastor at Druid Hills Presbyterian Church. She and her husband reside in the Atlanta area with their three children.
Sacred Time at the Writing Table
I found my way to the Writing Table in the early days, during the lockdown part of the pandemic. I was at home, pastoring my church remotely, recording worship with only my dear spouse for tech support. And I was shepherding my children through virtual third grade and kindergarten, with a toddler underfoot. When I say that the Writing Table saved me in that season, I’m not exaggerating. The Writing Table was colleagues and community in the midst of intense isolation. It was grounding in the midst of deep overwhelm and exhaustion. And it was a structure for writing at a time when everything, especially creative work, felt daunting.
In that season, and across the time since, this hour set aside in the morning to gather, breathe, write, and share strategies together has become sacred time.
Supportive Community
During my years at the Writing Table, I’ve met university professors and seminary academics, scientists, book authors, bloggers, PhD candidates. I’ve watched people move through the stages of publication, from an idea to a draft to proposal to edits to publication. Some of those books my friends have written are on my shelves. Several have acknowledgments citing the Writing Table as a support that helped that book come into being. What an incredible gift to be some small part of supporting creative work like that!
In this illustrious company, I’m usually plugging away at the Writing Table on my weekly sermon, which is a strange form of writing. It has academic qualities and very personal ones. We preachers are, to borrow the old aphorism, supposed to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” Our words must be deeply grounded in history, theology, and faith, yet we must be agile so that our sermons are relevant to our people this very week. The words we craft matter deeply, shaping people’s lives and faithfulness. Yet we are often churning them out quickly, without much time to edit and refine in the midst of busy ministries that pull us in many directions.
Most sermons (at least mine!) will never be published, or even long remembered. They are delivered to the people in the pews and over the livestream, and then gone. When one Sunday is over I show up to the Writing Table the next Monday. I won’t be continuing some big project. I have to let yesterday’s sermon go. And I start over with a new text and a whole new Sunday on the way.
Being a Writer
I used to think “I’m not a writer… I’m just a pastor, just a preacher.” But over the years, I look around the Writing Table, and I see plenty of other pastors. They minister in many different settings, from the highest profile churches to the small parishes like the ones I’ve served, and from many different denominations. And I’ve heard again and again in the words and the very spirit of this group that being a writer isn’t about prestige or publication, titles or tenure. It’s not about a particular kind or way of writing. At the Writing Table, we practice and embody that being a writer is nothing more or less than showing up, honoring your intention to write, and doing the hard, messy, creative work of putting words together into meaning. No one is “just” anything.
At the Writing Table, everyone is a writer, because they showed up to write. Academics write research, syllabi, and lectures. Students write papers and dissertations. Authors write articles, blogs, and books to be published. Others write on personal projects like journals, memoirs, or poetry. And pastors like me work on things like sermons, prayers and other liturgy, church newsletter articles, and emails and other correspondence. And part of the magic of this supportive community is that each person who shows up IS a writer, honoring their own and each other’s commitment to their particular writing practice.
Gratitude
Over the years since those early pandemic days, through changes in my call and different rhythms of work, the Writing Table has been a constant in my life, and a gift. This community and this writing practice has formed and transformed me as a pastor and preacher, as a person, and yes, as a writer, which I now claim boldly as part of my identity. The Writing Table has provided a circle of fellow writers who have become dear to me. It offers a simple daily practice that provides grounding in a profession that can be wearying. It creates a routine and structure for the writing that makes up a good portion of my ministry.
When I show up for this sacred hour, I am a pastor and a writer, and thankful for it.
